NASA Committee Recommends Ejection Seats

PAUL RECER

Published 7:00 pm, Tuesday, March 25, 2003

Associated Press Writer

NASA can expect to lose one and possibly two more space shuttles before 2020 and only the installation of a pressurized ejection system could save the astronaut crews, a safety panel told top space agency officials.

In a report delivered Tuesday but written before the Feb. 1 loss of space shuttle Columbia, members of the Aerospace Safety Advisory Panel told officials at the National Aeronautics and Space Administration that the agency should renew and intensify efforts to develop equipment that would allow astronauts to safely bail out in an emergency.

Without such safety devices, said Sidney M. Gutierrez, a former astronaut and a member of the safety panel, more astronaut lives are almost certain to be lost in crashes of one or two of the three remaining shuttles.

"If we fly this vehicle until 2020, we can be assured we'll lose another vehicle and maybe two," he said.

Gutierrez said NASA's record of losing two shuttles in 113 flights violates the agency's own safety margin requirements. He said NASA calls for manned spacecraft to have a 99.99 percent probability of safe return, while the demonstrated rate of failure with the space shuttle shows just over 98 percent probability of safe return.

"We're losing people too often in space," said Gutierrez, who flew on Columbia in 1991.

The safety margin cannot be appreciably improved with upgrades to other elements of the space shuttle, he said, but pressurized ejection systems, which would protect astronauts during high speed, high altitude bailouts, would offer protection for the crew.

The safety panel called on NASA to renew efforts to develop and install space shuttle ejection systems or to report back to the committee on why such equipment is impossible to put on the spacecraft.

"The heart of the recommendation is that you concentrate on getting the crew back," said Gutierrez. "That is a change in the whole culture of NASA."

He said the space agency has been operating under the philosophy that the way to return the crew safely was to return the spacecraft safely.

Bryan D. O'Connor, NASA's associate administrator for safety and once on an astronaut crew with Gutierrez, said he was anxious to see if NASA engineers could develop an ejection system for the shuttle.

O'Connor said that following the 1986 Challenger accident, which killed seven astronauts, the agency studied ejection systems and found there were significant problems due to weight and cost. Eventually, he said, the agency compromised by installing a parachute bailout system that worked only when the shuttle was flying level at 20,000 feet or lower. Most considered the system of only marginal value.

NASA Administrator Sean O'Keefe said the agency was developing a new type of spacecraft, called an orbital space plane, that would be used only to carry astronauts. That would mean the space shuttle could then be reserved for cargo with only a minimum crew. He said the shuttle could possibly be flown automatically, with no people on board at all.

But Gutierrez said that ignoring the possibility of a new safety system on the shuttle because the agency is building the orbital space plane "is not acceptable."

The 106-page safety report noted in an insert that it was written before the Feb. 1 loss of Columbia and the document was not changed. However, the space shuttle accident was at the center of much of the discussion between NASA officials and the safety panel during Tuesday's three-hour meeting.

The report also called on NASA to reconsider the ways it certifies the space shuttle for launch, noting that the remaining shuttles already are technically past their designed lifetime of 10 years and that age alone may be affecting the fleet's safety.

Robert B. Sieck, a retired NASA launch director, said there have been several recent failures in ground equipment and systems on the space shuttle that may be linked to age. Because the equipment was designed more than 20 years ago, he said, the standards of safety certification should be re-evaluated and, perhaps, revised.

"The system is in its mid-life and it would be appropriate for it to get a mid-life recertification," he said.

The board investigating the Columbia accident already has indicated it is looking into whether Columbia's age played a role the space craft's breakup as it returned to Earth. Admiral Harold Gehman, heading the investigation, declined to comment Tuesday on the safety panel's report, saying he had not yet read the findings.